When Aziraphale proposes that they swap appearances, he makes it very clear that he doesn't mean swap bodies. He justifies it by saying that, if Heaven and Hell were to seek their deaths, just switching consciousnesses wouldn't be enough. Their bodies have been soaking in the essence of a demon and an angel since the birth of man, and hellfire and holy water would still burn.
Crowley, however, knows that a mirage will not be enough to convince either side. In the same way their projections cannot be mistaken for flesh, if they are discorporated, angels and demons would see through a mirage, no matter the determined miracle which brought it about. Therefore, to make sure Aziraphale does not make a fuss, he offers to do the switch.
"What's one more demonic miracle?" he says flippantly, waving his hands and trailing a hand down the length of a leaf of one of his grander plants. It trembles under his touch. He pretends not to notice the sweet little smile Aziraphale gives him.
"Crowley," Aziraphale acknowledges, grateful, in that tone of voice that only he can call up. Crowley pretends his ears aren't growing red.
"Alright, come on angel," he prompts, distracting away from the tenderness that had lilted its way through the air, dancing between them. He steps away from the plants. "The sooner, the better, right?" He offers his hand.
"Quite," Aziraphale agrees, taking it. Crowley focuses, willing his essence to bend to his desires. Not only does he switch their consciousnesses, but he also switches the placements of their bodies, one atom a time, creeping from their hands up their arms, all to give the illusion that he's creating a mirage overlapping their own forms. Aziraphale would notice if he cared to check, but he just stands there and watches. The tenderness in his eyes does not fade until sunglasses overlap them, and by then they are no longer Aziraphale's eyes anymore.
It's not often that he looks at himself in the mirror, but Crowley never really enjoys it. As much as he dresses his body and styles his hair to be beautiful, he's never liked looking at himself for too long, especially not in the eyes. Seeing those eyes with another man's thoughts and intentions behind them is unnerving, and he looks away, unable to watch any longer.
He instead looks down at his (Aziraphale's) hands. They're stubbier than his, and rounder. The skin is… soft. Crowley realizes that, for all the handshakes they've shared, and the lingering touches, he's never noticed just how soft Aziraphale is. He's like silk. Like holy.
When he makes to leave the house, Crowley knows that he hasn't been kicked out. He's heading out of his own accord, leaving his plants and his halls to Aziraphale's loving care (maybe a bit too loving, in the plants' cases, he'll have to do a bit of damage control when he gets back) and it'll all be fine.
It doesn't stop him from feeling a bit like he's leaving something behind, though.
Aziraphale's skin is too tight for him. Too cherished.
The angels are surprisingly efficient at kidnapping, when they come for him.
Aziraphale doesn't notice he's been taken, at first, and he can't help but make these pathetic, muffled little noises through the tape in a vain effort to get his attention. Aziraphale, in Crowley's clothes, turns to look for him and when he notices what's happening, screams in horror. He dashes forward, trying to get him back.
Crowley knows that they did this, wore each other's figures, expressly for the time that head office would call them in for their punishment. That doesn't stop it from being genuinely terrifying, however, when Hastur clocks Aziraphale on the head with a crowbar and Crowley is forced to watch as he slumps to the ground.
He's tempted to break his bonds and lunge for Aziraphale. He's really tempted to. But it's not something Aziraphale would do, so he can't, because they can't screw this up. It would damn them both, permanently. Painfully.
So he lets himself be dragged off, Uriel and Sandalphon watching him all the way.
They tie him down by his wrists to an office chair. The metal armrest digs into his (Aziraphale's) arm. He's surprised they don't bind his feet as well—but it's a rolling chair, so that would probably be awkward. Why did they tie him down to a rolling chair again? Crowley gets the almost unbearable urge to shuffle away. It's squashed when he sees Uriel and Sandalphon's eyes flick upward, and he hears footsteps approaching him from behind.
"Ah!" A voice calls, false cheer thick on its tongue. Gabriel. "Aziraphale. So glad you could join us." As he approaches, Gabriel squeezes Crowley's shoulder, and if they wouldn't have seen through a mirage before they definitely would now. The body switch was necessary.
"You could have just sent a message," Crowley says, his voice pleasant only by strict self-control. He has to act as Aziraphale would. He has to, he has to. "I mean, a kidnapping—in broad daylight."
"Call it what it was: an extraordinary rendition." Gabriel's voice has always sounded like he says everything through gritted teeth, even since the beginning. Crowley doubts there's a genuine atom in his form, with human vessel or without. Gabriel chuckles, and Crowley wishes vehemently that he could rip the vocal chords from his throat. "Now, have we heard from our new associate?" Gabriel addresses Uriel and Sandalphon, but he doesn't turn away.
"He's on his way," Uriel replies, and a cold dread settles in Crowley's gut. He has an idea as to what that means. He does not want his idea to be correct.
"He's on his way." Gabriel grins, a menacing thing. It's far too cruel an expression to be present on an angel's face. "I think you're gonna like this." Gabriel approaches him, slowly, his footsteps echoing in the vast chamber of the room. "I really do. And I bet you didn't see this one coming."
There's a cold, vindictive light in Gabriel's eyes. None of Hell's demons look anything like this. Everyone down there is hot and fuming; everyone's temper is just this shy of boiling over. There's a burning current of drive, of vengeance, bright and vivid and down there, it's alive. Call Hell what you want, but at least the people there are genuine. Every drop of hatred in their body is genuine. Every bit of sadistic glee is real and hot and spiking, in every body that stumbles along Hell's passageways. It's dark and damp and disgusting, yes, and for all the stereotypes it is cold, but the people—the people could heat the world with their fire.
Heaven is much colder than Hell.
Crowley has been here before. He was born here, way back in the beginning, and he spent a good time here while the universe was being built. It was only around the time of Earth's formation that he fell, and he didn't mean to fall, not really. But Heaven had always made his footsteps echo, for how far the distance was between him and everyone else. Between everyone and everyone, really—he's sure that no one up there has ever made a real, true friend. He's sure no one has even had anything to talk about with a friend. They're like machines, all of them, duty their primary objective.
Heaven is a gaping, hollow, serrated thing. Humans speak of it with reverence, praise its light and harmony. But it has never been a kind place and it has never been a warm place and the only harmony it's begotten is the clockwork schedule that all the angels follow, precise and to the letter. Heaven has always been a gaping maw and the air in it tense and judging, and Crowley hates hell but he despises Heaven.
Hell is awful, yes, but Heaven is worse.
If the Almighty really wanted it to turn out this way, she wanted all those angels to fall in the beginning. Crowley had begun hanging around those who would become the fallen because they were vibrant; they had wants, and likes, and dislikes. They were interesting. They weren't necessarily pure. They were so bright, and Crowley wanted that brightness—he wanted something real, something that wasn't unblemished white, something that didn't echo and didn't yawn with distance. Something that is blinding in a way Heaven could never be. Something yellow or golden, something warm and singing. If God really wanted him to fall, she wanted Crowley to learn to live, vivid and golden.
If God really wanted him to fall, she didn't want the angels to be machines for eternity.
But falling hurt, and the demons Crowley fell alongside were very quick to turn bitter. What had once been a little community of life he had found soon became a festering thing, a dark and bottomless pit of loathing. From the fallen arose Hell as antithesis to Heaven, but they've never been opposites. They've been mirror images since the beginning. Two suffocating homes, cruel as anything.
Crowley never wants to go back to Hell. He's never wanted to come back to Heaven, either, and by God does he never want Aziraphale to have to come back here either.
When the demon enters the room, Gabriel's face twists in visible disgust. Uriel and Sandalphon have more self-control than that, fortunately, and Crowley would be amused if he were not preoccupied with the healthy amount of horror that is presently dissolving his insides.
The swirling, growing spout of hellfire that the demon lights is enough to make the angels jerk away. They can surely feel the heat of it, though it does not register much to Crowley. Here, he lets some of the Aziraphale mask slide away. The disdain he feels for this whole situation is almost too much at this point. He really, really wants to get it all over with.
An inkling of dread creeps at the back of his neck, though. Aziraphale's argument that their vessels might not be able to take exposure to holy water or hellfire makes more sense than Crowley's willing to acknowledge, and he hopes that this doesn't kill him. It probably won't, if the body reacts—it'll probably just kill the flesh, and his essence would be left to deal with the fallout. He hopes nonetheless.
Uriel frees him of his bonds before his execution, an action Crowley didn't foresee. Even labeled a traitor, the angels still have expectations of Aziraphale. Even though he averted all of Armageddon, Heaven still believes he'll follow orders.
Crowley desperately wants to run, just to see what they'd make of it. He doesn't, though. The point of this is to get them to leave well enough alone, not instigate a manhunt.
"I don't suppose I can persuade you to reconsider?" Crowley says, straightening his (Aziraphale's) clothes and tie. The plea is futile and he knows it. It's the only reason he lets it leave his lips. "We're meant to be the good guys, for Heaven's sake."
"Well, for Heaven's sake, we are meant to make examples out of traitors." Oh, how Crowley wishes to punch Gabriel's lights out. "So. Into the flame."
Crowley sets his jaw, looking away from the angels. He's not afraid of this. Hellfire is like a warm bath to him. But he's nervous, just a little, that it won't be to this body. If nothing else, Aziraphale would be disappointed to lose it again so soon, and that's enough to make the hesitance in Crowley's step genuine.
"Right." He stops, just before the flames, and turns back toward Gabriel. "Well. Lovely knowing you all. May we meet on a better occasion." The smile that he lets crease his face is genuinely sweet, and Crowley thinks this bit here is his finest work of the hour—one last burst of Aziraphale to sell the performance.
"Shut your stupid mouth, and die already." Gabriel smiles, the frustration dancing in his eyes. Oh, definitely Crowley's best work. Without question.
The satisfaction doesn't quite spread in him, though.
All the Aziraphale falls from Crowley's face as he meets Gabriel's eyes, and steps into the fire.
Aziraphale's body does not burn, and Crowley almost falls to his knees and thanks whatever he can that it doesn't. Instead, he just lets his head fall back, enjoying the warmth. He cracks his neck once, twice, just a small intimidation. Just to put the angels off a bit. He can practically hear their confusion and growing horror, and it is delicious.
Ah, there's the satisfaction, he thinks, and breathes fire at the angels to watch them jump.
Very satisfying, indeed.
They meet back up in a park, and Crowley thinks he'll never again be so relieved to see his own face.
"Do you think they'll leave us alone now?" he asks, lounging back against the park bench in a way Aziraphale never would. It doesn't matter much that he keep up the act now, and sitting so primly had gotten tiring after a while.
"At a guess, they'll pretend it never happened," Aziraphale says, and there's a beat. "Right. Anyone looking?"
Crowley checks briefly, probing into the nearby celestial space for any onlookers. "Nobody. Right. Swap back, then?" He offers his hand, looking Aziraphale in the eyes.
He performs the switch back the same way he'd switched them initially: atom by atom, consciousness finding home in the right vessel and vessels on a new side of the bench. It doesn't matter, really, that he keep up the charade of the switch being a mirage, but—and Crowley would never admit this aloud—he fears Aziraphale would be upset with him.
He looks away as soon as Aziraphale's eyes are his own, letting go and opening and closing his hand, getting used to the scrape of his own dry skin again. His flesh finally doesn't feel too tight. It's a release he hadn't been quite conscious he'd needed. Beside him, he hears Aziraphale shudder, a little huff escaping him. It must have been as unnerving for him as it was for Crowley.
If he looked, he'd see an unsettled expression on Aziraphale's face. He'd notice the way Aziraphale adjusts his collar and his cuffs is lingering, is tentative, and maybe he'd piece together that Aziraphale had caught on along the way. A mirage could never be quite so lifelike, after all.
But he doesn't. Instead, he lets Aziraphale talk about making Michael miracle him a towel, and he laughs, and it's a real laugh. It's a good one.
Crowley is happy, truly, to have his feet (his own feet) back on Earth. He's happier that Aziraphale is with him, and he's ecstatic that Agnes Nutter was right.
Happiness is still a little foreign to him. Maybe it always will be.
As long as he and Aziraphale don't have to go back to where they started, though… maybe, just maybe, he'll have the chance to feel a little more like it fits: Crowley, happy.
Just maybe.